<p>chrisw, shut up.</p>
<p>The OP said in his post that Penn is his top choice, and I do not see how the College cannot provide a French & Business education that is on par with that of Wharton. And I do not see how the College suppresses the OP’s interests in any appreciable manner.</p>
<p>So what happens when one applies to all the Ivies (where one wants to go to), but due to a bad application package gets rejected from all of them. Now what? Keep dreaming big? Get a grip dude.</p>
<p>ha, my bad. Didn’t read that he was interested in French too. Disregard all I said! I thought he had his heart set on Wharton, which would make what I said legit, but if the kid wants French as well, the College French department is amazing. Regardless, he should apply to the school he wants to go to and could show the most passion for, not the school he thinks he can get into.</p>
<p>And by “school” I mean school within a University. If you have a 3.0 GPA and haven’t done anything in high school, then yeah you’re not going to get into Harvard and should look more into local two-year or four-year colleges. I’d never suggest that someone should apply only to places he’d love to go to without safeties. If you’re applying to Harvard, Princeton, Penn, Stanford, etc. you should also apply to less competitive schools as your backup plan. I was, however, speaking only about Penn and intra-Penn schools!</p>
<p>sorry for that little misread on my part!</p>
<p>… oh, actually to respond to one part of DSI’s last post… as far as an actual “business education,” the College can’t match Wharton because it isn’t going for that. The College’s requirements are entirely different, so someone who does, say, a French and Econ major will have a whole different set of skills and credentials than someone who does French and Finance or the Huntsman Program. But someone who enrolls in the College shouldn’t come in assuming he’ll be able to transfer into or dual degree with Wharton…</p>
<p>disgradius and DSI, you guys are a little harsh. Enough people die at work before hitting 40 for people to consider applying to “most interesting path” rather than “path of least resistance.” </p>
<p>Quite frankly, EVERYONE is a stretch for Wharton. It’s a matter of how you tickle the Adcom with your application.</p>
<p>Bit harsh there DSI but can’t say I don’t agree with your points. Plus I don’t see how the OP will be happy being beaten about by the wharton curve if his academics aren’t his strong suit even if he does get in.</p>
<p>Lets think economics here shall we? If one has a much higher chance of getting in elsewhere that will provide him with just slightly reduced happiness, doesn’t it make sense to go for that instead?</p>
<p>Plus, economically, its always best to go for something more certain. Extremes exert too much pressure and yield greater damages than are usually calculated initially (i.e. what if the worst case scenario as DSI says happens?)</p>
<p>necro - I think the OP is much more suited for college than wharton. If he was a business fanatic, I’d encourage him to apply anyways.</p>
<p>Firstly, at the very least College students can take Wharton classes. Sure, not an all-out business-only experience, but I do not see where the OP demanded that.</p>
<p>Secondly, there is nothing harsh about my comments that is uncalled for. chrisw posted twice saying this advice is bad that advice is bad without even reading the OP’s post!</p>
<p>Lastly, there are several from our school who applied to the Ivies and Stanford this year, only to be rejected from all of them. Their scores and ECs are by no means bad. Having some back-up is always preferrable.</p>
<p>Lets think economics here shall we? If one has a much higher chance of getting in elsewhere that will provide him with just slightly reduced happiness, doesn’t it make sense to go for that instead?</p>
<p>Just wondering, what is the specific utility curve we’re working on here?
For the OP, let’s take four possible paths and let’s use arbitrary likelihood percentages.</p>
<p>School, University, Percent Likelihood of Admission, 100 Point Scale of Happiness
<p>With these arbitrary numbers, we can figure out some things. The OP would be happiest at Wharton, most likely to get into Drexel and least happy at Penn Nursing. Here, the likelihood of getting into Nursing is greater than College or Wharton, but happiness is FAR decreased, so that’s probably not a good idea. Drexel is a clear safety and included only because it has a high acceptance rate (i.e. it has nothing to do with anything other than that… I almost went to good ol’ Drexel!).</p>
<p>With this randomness, there’s really not much of a difference in happiness between the College and Wharton, so the OP could apply to either and still be happy. But what if we change those top two so that it is as follows:</p>
<ol>
<li>Wharton, UPenn, 15%, 95</li>
<li>College, UPenn, 25%, 50</li>
<li>College, Drexel, 90%, 40</li>
</ol>
<p>Then, even though the College gives him a noticeable admissions advantage, he is significantly less likely to be happy at the College, so he would be better off applying to Drexel, which gives a much easier chance of acceptance and only a slightly lower happiness value.</p>
<p>If you’re thinking economics and happiness, you gotta think utility! So since nobody here knows what the OP is actually thinking, this might be a case where the OP needs to just figure it out and pick a place to apply to!</p>
<p>indeed, I actually meant the economics thing to be a joke a nod to applied econ of wharton. But I did assume that college didn’t differ too much from wharton since it was penn he said he liked when he visited. On the other hand, his application is not suited for wharton so I’d say the difference in admissions chances between wharton/college is increased while the difference in utility should be decreased.</p>
<p>As a side note, did anybody else find ap econ incredibly easy?
I started self-studying ap microecon a week before the test and got a 5 and started macroecon 2 days before the test and reasonably confident I got a 5 as well.</p>
<p>btw dsi, while taking wharton classes from the college can help improve his knowledge, it does not look the same on a resume :(</p>
<p>Firstly, at the very least College students can take Wharton classes. Sure, not an all-out business-only experience, but I do not see where the OP demanded that.</p>
<p>I mean, we can only count four Wharton classes toward our graduation requirement, so it’s really not much of a business experience whatsoever. That said, Political Economy classes, some Economics classes, and some of the other inter-disciplinary courses are business oriented, so you could get that kind of thing, but it absolutely depends on the interests of the applicant.</p>
<p>Secondly, there is nothing harsh about my comments that is uncalled for. chrisw posted twice saying this advice is bad that advice is bad without even reading the OP’s post!</p>
<p>Hey! I read it, just missed the part where he said anything about French!</p>
<p>*Lastly, there are several from our school who applied to the Ivies and Stanford this year, only to be rejected from all of them. Their scores and ECs are by no means bad. Having some back-up is always preferrable. *</p>
<p>Hell yeah, this college business is absolute nonsense. For the love of God I got rejected by BC, Cornell and Bucknell, got into Penn State Main but not into Schreyer’s, and didn’t get any money anywhere except Drexel, yet I got into Penn? Still makes very little sense to me haha</p>
<p>hmmm
well i like the heated debate about my educational plans hahaha
thanks for the suggestion of the college, I haven’t actually considered that and will look into it.
Also-are my academics really that bad for Penn? I mean I know they wouldn’t be stellar but I thought I be in the mid range.</p>
<p>btw i don’t know where you all got the idea i visited, i actually never have lmao but I plan to this summer</p>
<p>for penn, they might not be as bad. For wharton, stats are usually higher. Plus, they look really favourably upon business oriented/leadership or initiative.</p>
<p>btw, I know you can’t do anything about it but the 3’s don’t look so good. try getting a few more 5s to offset it?</p>
<p>also, chris, glad we got the misunderstanding smoothed out :D</p>
<p>Centaur, no your academics aren’t bad at all. </p>
<p>[The</a> College](<a href=“http://www.college.upenn.edu/]The”>http://www.college.upenn.edu/)</p>
<p>Look up the different Majors & Minors as well as the requirements. Check out the descriptions of different courses to see if you’d be interested in them… that should give you a good idea of what you might like.</p>
<p>Disgracious, yeah I was joking too. c’mon, utility curves for college choices? give me a break, it’s a tough decision but not damn rocket science!</p>
<p>-_- I did an economic breakdown of my college choices in my head… well I processed my choices based on economic principles…</p>
<p>btw, I’m not disgracious 
<em>feels insulted</em> :P</p>
<p>PS - chrisw, you heading to penn?</p>
<p>Reading and paying attention are not my strong suits :-P</p>
<p>I’m going to be a junior at Penn this year, actually. woo PSCI major!</p>
<p>I’m guessing that you’re a froshie?</p>
<p>aye,</p>
<p>frosh at wharton, going into finance most likely. Show me around :D.</p>
<p>I do happen to know someone studying for a MD there too lol but I think they’ll probably be too busy to bother with me.</p>
<p>chrisw, your economic analysis is solid but needs to go one step further. Your second set of numbers, given that Upenn and Drexel are not mutually exclusive, suggest the notion of a portfolio. Utility and risk appear to be optimized with a combination of Drexel and Wharton.</p>
<p>entering freshman year –> finance & risk management</p>
<p>wow this is getting off topic… but yeah, I agree that if its not penn as a whole that OP likes then they should go for wharton with safeties.</p>
<p>haha i like the economic analysis of colleges</p>
<p>Update: My common app essay has been reworked, and it is pretty good now!
assess me again with an above average essay
oh also, i will probably get the wendy’s heisman award in my school</p>
<p>You are a qualified candidate. Nobody is going to tell you you’re going to get in because nobody knows who’s getting in except admissions officers, so realistically nothing has changed!</p>
<p>I think your numbers are a bit low, but I think the decision ultimately depends on your essays and recommendations and just how well you prepare your essay. From all my reading on this forum in the past, Wharton cares about two big things: math, and leadership.</p>
<p>When I applied, I crafted everything I did on my application to emphasize my math skills or leadership ability. UPenn’s app is long, but it really gives you a lot of opportunities to persuade the reader to accept you, so definitely work hard on those essays. For the record, I wrote an essay about running and how I eventually became a captain of my track/cross country teams.</p>